Sooke

Bird Watching

Birds of a feather flock here year-round, but it's the spring/fall migratory seasons and a busy avian winter that make Sooke such a primetime birdwatching centre.

Waterfowl Paradise

Whiffin Spit is widely regarded by birders for its easy access to a who's who of ducks and shorebirds. Pack binoculars, a picnic lunch and a good local guidebook (The Birder's Guide to Vancouver Island by Royal British Columbia Museum ornithologist Keith Taylor, for instance), and many pleasant hours can be spent on the rocky strip that stretches out into Sooke Harbour. Some birds prefer the calm harbourside waters, while others like to splash and tumble in the surf rolling in from the Juan de Fuca Strait.

Possible sightings during these rush-hour seasons: sandpipers, plovers, terns, oystercatchers and black Brant geese. Winter residents include common and red-throated loons, hooded mergansers, grebes and a wide variety of ducks – harlequin, mallards, buffleheads and widgeons, among them. Eagles, gulls of all kinds and great blue herons are year-round sightings.

East Sooke Vulture Watch

Turkey vultures (aka buzzards) gather in the hundreds from mid-September to the end of October in East Sooke Regional Park, a resting stage on their migration south. After fuelling up on tasty scraps, the scavengers with the red heads, broad wingspan and majestic spiraling flight patterns set off on the long flap across the Juan de Fuca Strait to Washington State. The park is also known as a "hawk watch" hotpoint for its peregrine falcons, red-tailed hawks, kestrels, osprey and bald eagles.

Ayum Creek Park

On the eastern side of town in Saseenos, this small park in the 5600 block of Highway 14 (aka the Sooke Road) protects a salmon-spawning habitat. Stroll the riverside trail out to a grassy field and the mud-flat shoreline. Nesting boxes attract many kinds of birds, and the marshes here are a great hideout for ducks and their too-cute offspring.